So much of what is important in my life seems to happen by accident. I found the reading film and books by accident, and I met Mary Lou by accident, and found
I will stop now. I have dropped the pen too many times. My hand will not hold it.
Mary Lou. Mary Lou. I cannot stand this.
DAY EIGHTY-EIGHT
It is five days since I last wrote. My hands are better now, stronger, and I can hold the pen fairly well. But my back and side still ache.
My feet are better. After several days here I noticed that many of my fellow prisoners were barefoot, and I reported for work the next morning without my shoes. My feet are still sore, but they are healing. And my muscles are beginning to feel stronger, tighter.
I am not happy! I am very unhappy, but I no longer am certain that I want to die. Drowning is a possibility. But I will wait awhile before I decide.
The robot guards are horrible. One has beaten me, and I see them beat other prisoners. I know it is terribly wrong of me, but I would like to kill the one who beat me, before I die. I am shocked at myself for wanting that, but it is one of the things that make me want to live. He has tiny red eyes like some hateful and cruel animal, and heavy muscles that bulge under his brown uniform. I could smash his face with a brick.
And, before I die, I want to bring my journal up to now. It is still daylight outside. If I work steadily I think I can write about how I came to be sent here before I must go to sleep.
For several days Mary Lou and I had been coming back, over and over, to the book of poems. We would read them aloud to one another, only barely understanding them. One poem we kept coming back to is called “The Hollow Men.” Early one afternoon I was reading it aloud while sitting on the floor next to Mary Lou. I believe I can write the words down:
And that was as far as I got. The door opened and Dean Spofforth walked in. He stood over us hugely, folded his arms, and stared down. It was shocking to see him in my room like this. Mary Lou had never seen him before, and she was staring up at bun with her eyes very wide.
There was something odd about his appearance and it took me a moment to tell what it was. And then I realized it; Spofforth was wearing a broad black armband with the white face of
Mary Lou was the first to speak. “What do you want?” she said. She did not sound frightened.
“You are both under arrest,” Spofforth said. And then, “I want you both to stand.”
We stood up. I was still holding the book. “Well?” Mary Lou said.
Spofforth looked her steadily in the face. “I am a Detector, and you have been detected.”
I could tell that she was shocked and trying not to show it. I wanted to put my arm around her, to protect her somehow. But I just stood there.
Spofforth was much taller than either of us, and his dignity and force were overwhelming. I had always been afraid of him and now his saying that he was a Detector had me speechless.
“Detected doing what?” Mary Lou said. There was a slight trembling in her voice.
Spofforth stared at her, unblinking. “Detected in cohabitation. Detected in the teaching of reading and detected in the act of reading itself.”
“But, Dean Spofforth,” I broke in, “you already
“Yes,” he said, “and I told you clearly that reading would not be taught at this university. The teaching of reading is a crime.”
Something sank deep inside me. I felt the strength and excitement that had been so much of my life for recent days all go away and I was standing in front of this massive robot like a little child. “A
“Yes, Bentley,” he said. “Your hearing will be tomorrow. You are to remain in your room until I return in the morning.”
Then he took Mary Lou by the arm and said, “You will come with me.”
She tried to pull away from him and then, finding she could not break his grip, she said, “Bug off, robot. Bug off, for Christ’s sake.”
He looked at her and seemed to laugh. “That won’t work,” he said. But his voice softened and he added, “No harm will come to you.”
And as he went out the door he turned and looked at me. “Don’t be too unhappy, Bentley. This may all be for the best.”
She went with him without a struggle, and he pulled the door shut behind himself.
No harm? What worse harm could there be than this separation? Where is she? Where is Mary Lou?
I am crying as I write. I cannot finish now. I will take sopors and sleep.
DAY EIGHTY-NINE
There is more to tell than I can say in the time that I have. But I will try.
Spofforth himself took me to court. I was handcuffed and he brought me on a black thought bus to a place in Central Park called Justice House. It was a two-story plastic building with dirty windows.
The courtroom was large. There were many pictures of strange-looking men on the walls. Some of them were wearing the suits and ties that I had seen in ancient films. One man stood in front of a bookcase, much like Douglas Fairbanks. And under his picture there was writing. It said: “
There was a black-robed robot judge sitting in an armchair at the far end of the courtroom, facing the entranceway. I started when I saw him; I had seen his face before. It was the face of the Make Seven headmaster at the dormitory in Ohio where I had been educated. An Upper-Management Robot. I remembered hearing once, “All Make Sevens look alike.” And I, being just a child, had said, “Why?” and the child I was talking to had said, “Don’t ask; relax.”
The judge was dormant when we came in. That is, his power had been turned off. Next to him was sitting, also dormant, and in a lower, simpler chair, a Make Four clerk robot.
When we got closer I could see that there was yellowish dust, like that in the sealed-off part of the library, all over each of them. The intelligent-looking creases on the judge’s face were filled with yellow dust. His hands
